The Fathers of My Son
by cmguysgirl
Summary: There was a reason Erin Strauss favored her son. He was a living reminder of the man she loved and lost. She loves her daughters also, but their father never held as special a place in her heart. She'd been blessed to get a second change with him, but there was a time when her son and memories were all she would ever have of David Rossi.
1. Chapter 1 The Pre-story

**The Fathers of My Son **

A/N: Visit You Give Me Fever, A Rossi/Strauss Forum  forum/You-Give-Me-Fever/120042/

Feel free to post your own story prompts/ideas at the forum.

Disclaimer: I don't own Criminal Minds or I would definitely be better off financially especially as I would create a Men of the BAU calendar. The show belongs to the people who actually make money off of it and it is a good thing to as I could never come up with the great plots they do or the sexy naughtiness that is Morgan and Garcia's bread and butter. I make no money off of this and have no money so suing me would just give you custody of all my other bills. If the owners of the show want to pay them, well I am all for it.

This was the first Criminal Minds Fan Fic I wrote. It wasn't the first CM story I posted though, My Brother's Keeper was as it came together in one sitting. When this ideal came to me, what you will see posted as part two was actually written first. Part one was actually written second but I decided to put the logical beginning first and not do it as it was written. This is posted as a story prompt on my forum, You give me fever and although I have written this as my version of the prompt (okay it is a detailed prompt but feel free to take the ideal and make it your own, changing the details where you see fit. It would be nice if you do give a shout out to the forum as the place where you found the prompt, as that might lead to others discovering the forum and more stories about our favorite ship Rossi/Strauss. I love to read fan fic and am not as gifted as a lot of writers who can see an ideal and whip up a story or stories quickly so creating the forum was my way of hopefully helping us get more glimpses into the lives of our favorite couple (as the show certainly isn't giving us anything this season. That one scene at the end of the Season Premier and nothing since. Come on, what is up with that. Hopefully they will give us something soon, although from the synopsis that have been released so far, there is nothing Strauss/Rossi related in the next few episodes either. Viva the world of fan fic, where at least we can fill in the blanks the show leaves in the lives of our duo.

Let's just say this story concept stems from the Episode where Hotch profiled Strauss and her son, I believe it was her middle child (but I never mind AU if someone wants to make him the oldest or youngest) looks a lot like Rossi (As an aside, I saw a pic of the actresses real son and I wonder if he posed for the pic).

Well in my story ideal, Strauss did indeed get pregnant by Rossi and had his baby and Named him after Rossi, specifically Anthony David Rossi. She and husband were divorced at the time she and Rossi were involved but it didn't work out and she went back to her husband for her child's (children's) sake and after she remarried her ex husband she found out she was carrying David's child. She told Rossi of course and he respected her decision.

I haven't gotten that far in the fic to have written down that he stays in the child's life but I know he does as the original ideal that came to my mind (that hasn't made it on paper yet) was set a few years after he returned to the BAU and no one knows about her son being his or that the real reason he left in the first place is that he couldn't stand any longer to see her day in and day out and know that she belonged to another man, and not him. That is also why he didn't come back, until her found out she had divorced her husband).

Hotch of course saw it, how much the little boy in the pictures in her office, looked like the senior profiler, that was the unspoken undercurrent between Strauss and Hotch during that scene and why she asked how he knew she favored her son, but Hotch being the gentleman that he is and friend to Rossi (or his brother if this decides to set itself in my AU, My Brother's Keeper), chose to not directly address the question (I am not sure if Hotch knows for sure or not, as I don't think Rossi has ever mentioned to him or anyone else that the child is his son, even though Hotch is his best friend).

This story tells the reason that Rossi left the BAU not long after the child was born. And if you watch the show, as much as they seem to be in each others hip pockets, and hang out, they don't necessarily know everything about the other's personal live or homes, but like I said in the original ideal, Strauss is now and has been for a few years, divorced from her husband. I actually didn't envision the reason why they divorced in my original concept but when I started writing the first part, the reason, for the first divorce, just came out on paper (As I wrote this part, they told me the reason for the second and final divorce).

I hoped these characters would start talking to me (and not long after I wrote this line they did and the story started to flow from their own lips) as that is the best way for a story to be written, when the characters just appear in your head and start talking and it is like you have a movie in your head and can actually see, experience, feel what they are telling you in their own words and all you have to do is just copy down what you have witnessed.

End of the Pre-story.

Now click the drop down box to go to Part One

CMGUYSGIRL


	2. Chapter 2

**The Fathers of My Son **

Disclaimer**:** I don't own Criminal Minds. I barely own my mental sanity.

A/N: Visit You Give Me Fever, A Rossi/Strauss Forum  forum/You-Give-Me-Fever/120042/

Feel free to post your own story prompts/ideas at the forum.

Her son really belongs to him. Her girls to her husband. Well ex-husband, as she was divorced. Erin Strauss (being an independent woman she went by her maiden name) and David Rossi were together for 6 months. David got jealous of her ex and the woman who became Rossi's wife # 2 set him up in conjunction with Erin's ex husband. They schemed to make it look like Strauss was cheating on David with her ex-husband. Their reasons were obvious: Mary, wanted to marry Rossi and Richard Marksman wanted his ex-wife, Erin back.

Rossi broke Strauss' heart when he believed it. She went back to her ex-husband and remarried him three weeks later for her daughter's sake. Two weeks after she remarried, she realized she was carrying Rossi's child.

After losing Erin, Rossi tried hard to go back to his playboy ways and act like he wasn't affected at all. Most nights when he wasn't on a case, he drank himself into a stupor. During one of these nights, while he was highly inebriated, Mary talked him into flying to Vegas and a quicky wedding. It was a rebound marriage for Rossi. When he woke up hung over in the hotel the next morning, he couldn't believe what he had done. Rossi knew then and there that he had to change his behavior. He realized that he couldn't keep destroying himself over losing the woman he loved as seeing him self destruct, would crush her. He knew he had to go on and pretend to be happy, even if he wasn't, because he loved Erin Strauss enough to want to her to be happy, even if it wasn't with him.

Erin and David eventually forgave each other. He divorced wife # 2 when he found out what she had done. Mary never told Rossi about Richard Marksman's involvement in breaking Strauss and Rossi up, out of spite. She figured if she couldn't have David, she would make sure, he couldn't have Erin. Rossi's ex-wife Mary blackmailed Strauss' husband, with their shared secret for years.

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Strauss hid her pregnancy for the first few months, until she had decided how she was going to tell her husband and if she should tell Rossi. She knew right away what she was going to do when it came to Rossi. How she was going to deal with her husband took her a considerable amount of time and energy to work out. Strauss knew that what happened after she told Richard, would not only effect him and her but also their daughter. While it was true her daughter Kristina was still too young to understand what a divorce was, she did feel the tension between mommy and daddy before they divorced and she didn't understand why daddy didn't live with them anymore, when Erin and her husband were living apart. And then Erin and David started seeing each other. The little girl took to Rossi immediately. He spoiled her rotten when he was around and she knew, even at her age that she had him wrapped around her little fingers. While her father Richard loved her, and spent time with her, he was more reserved in nature than Rossi. He would hug her when she ran up to him when he came home from work but she had to wait until he changed out of his work clothes before he would even consider playing with her. Whereas Rossi would play with her no matter what he was wearing, be it casual clothes or a Tuxedo.

If they weren't playing horsey, they were playing helicopter. Rossi was great at spinning yarns and he would tell her amazing stories of adventure, knights and princesses. He would even help Erin read Kristina bedtime stories, after they said her prayers with the child. Rossi would do the different character voices and add his own spin on the events. This would usually lead to excited giggling and the tickle monster before Erin would have to remind the two of them that the purpose of a bedtime story was to relax enough so you can go to sleep, not get the child so keyed up that she would be awake past her bedtime. They would both say sorry and the story would be finished in a calmer manner as her daughter drifted off to sleep. Krissy loved David and the feeling was mutual on his part. Once or twice, Krissy had even convinced the big, bad profiler David Rossi to play tea party with her and her dolls. He'd sworn Erin to secrecy on that one. When Strauss and Rossi broke up, he missed Erin's daughter as much as he missed Erin as he had grown to love that little girl as if she was his own child. Kristina missed Rossi as much as he missed her. Erin hated the fact that this was the second time her daughter her inability to sustain a relationship had caused her daughter to lose someone she cared about. Remarrying her ex-husband was one way Strauss felt she could help make it up to her daughter. Little did she know that not long after she remarried, she would have a secret that was so big, it would one again threaten her daughter's happiness.

The thought of not having the baby never crossed Strauss' mind. There was no way on God's green earth, that she would ever get rid of David's child. Truth be told, there was no way she would get rid of any child of hers. While she firmly believed to each his own, it just wasn't in her to do something like that.

Lucky for her, Strauss had been promoted to Assistant Section chief the week before she remarried. Having a desk job allowed her to keep her pregnancy a secret a lot longer than she would have been able to if she had still been a field agent. She was almost three months along now and knew even if she didn't work as closely with Rossi as she had when she was a field agent, he was a great profiler and if she wasn't careful, he'd figure out she was pregnant before she told him and that would end any hope she had of getting him back-off and let her husband be a father to the child.

Erin convinced David they needed to talk one day after leaving work. The time had come to tell him about his child. They were both married at the time, him to Mary and her to Richard, so they had informed their spouses that they would be a little late coming home that night. Erin had informed her husband the previously, that it wasn't his child she was carrying, so when she called him to let him know she was going to be late, she informed him that she might need his support when she got home and she had a feeling the conversation she was going to have tonight after work telling Rossi about the child would be very unpleasant for her. She once again thanked her husband for being so loving and understanding. Strauss apologized to him for hurting him, as she knew it couldn't be easy on him to watch her have another man's baby, even if the child was conceived while they weren't together. Erin told Richard again, how sorry she was that she hadn't known that she was pregnant before she remarried him, because she never would have done that, had she known. He told her, the same thing he usually did, that he was glad she didn't find out until afterward as he was grateful she remarried him.

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David was there with Erin when their son was born. Her husband was at work. Rossi's name was listed as the father on the Birth Certificate. Erin named their son after David, but she used Rossi's middle name for the baby's first name as she hoped it would be less of a reminder to her husband that he wasn't the child's biological dad, even though she knew that was a losing battle as her son, heavily favored Rossi. Although he agreed to let her husband raise his son as his own, David insisted on being a part of the child's life. In deference to his promise to not seek joint custody as long as his son was treated well as when he was old enough to understand the truth, his son be told that he was his biological father, the Marksmans, made Rossi the child's Godfather. In his official role of Godfather, David held his son in his arms during his baptism and promised to look after the child's wellbeing physically and spiritually, as Anthony David Rossi was dedicated to the church.

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Rossi knew Strauss and her husband had been trying to work things out as she had told him her spouse was a good man and she couldn't just leave him. Erin also admitted to David that she didn't love her husband with the all consuming passion she felt for him but she did love him and couldn't break the commitment she made to him and their family.

Not wanting to admit how much her words hurt him, Rossi tells her he is retiring. He says it is the job - that he needs to do other things. She tells him there have never been lies between them, despite what he thinks she did all those months ago. David tells her he knows as he takes her in his arms and holds her like he will never let go. Rossi apologizes to Strauss for all the things he said and did and for stupidly throwing away all they had. He tells her he wishes he had used his head back then, instead of speaking from his broken, damaged heart. If he had, he would have known she would never have done that to him- to them. He confides in her how much he wishes he had never thrown away the best thing that had ever happened to him. David looks Erin in the eye and says to her, the truth is that no matter how much she loves him, that fact that she stayed with her husband and honored the vows and commitment she made to her husband when she remarried him shows her true heart and that she could have never done what he thought she had done to him, not even with her ex-husband.

David kissed Erin on the forehead and pulled back slightly to look her in the eyes as he wanted to make sure she understands what he is about to tell her. He also her to be able to look into his eyes and know that what he is about to say is not designed to hurt her, even though he knows it will. He needs with everything deep within his soul for her to know that he is not trying to be malicious or vengeful nor is he speaking from wounded pride, but that he is emotionally going under the murky depths of a turbulent sea of heartache. His mind has finally gotten over the initial shock enough to realize the only way for him to survive is to start to swim towards the distant shore. The only way he can do that is if he forces himself to no longer dwell on how he got there but to move each slow, agonizing inch from where he is now, not stopping or looking back until he has reached firm ground again. Then and only then he will be able to stand still in one place without the fear of being pulled under and swept away forever.

The tears are freely flowing down Erin's cheeks. They are silent tears but each drop shatters what is left of her storm tossed heart, just a touch more. Strauss hates that Rossi is seeing her cry, almost as much as Rossi hates the fact that he is the one ,once again, putting tears in he eyes. David's heart shatters completely at that moment and brings him to his knees. The momentum brings Erin with him. She knows the look of torment on his face is something she will never forget, even if she lives to be two hundred years old. Her former lovers look of pure devastation, will forever be scorched in her mind and there is no way she will be able to ever erase it. She can't hold back the tears any longer. Seeing the face of the strong, fiercely loyal, independent man she loves more than her own life broken like this, is more than she can bare and the first gut wrenching, heart rending, sob escapes from her throat. Rossi holds her a little tighter. Time seems to cease as they hold on to each other. The anguish of their soon to be parting, wraps them in a cloud of desperation and despair. Neither of them knew how long they stayed that way. Somehow, they ended up lying on the floor wrapped up in each others arms - so emotionally wrung out that they next thing they knew is that they were waking up still holding on to each other as if one of them loosened their grip, the other would disappear into thin air.

Finally David took a deep breath, kissed Erin on the forehead one last time, stood up and extended a hand to help her up. He gently squeezed the hand he held and brought it slowly to his chest. Rossi placed Strauss' hand over his heart and held it there. He tried to be strong for her, but his voice still cracked slightly as he said, "You will always have my heart". David slowly let go over Erin's hand. Next he took a deep breath and forced his body to take a step back. He then turned and began to walk away from her. An audible gasp escaped Erin's throat before she could stop it. Rossi's step faltered for just a second but then he continued moving towards the door and out of her life. Erin almost cried out to stop him. There was nothing she wanted more in her life than to beg him to stay. Strauss was a person who never begged anyone for anything, but in that moment, she would have done it unashamedly. Erin knew with just one word, she didn't even have to add the don't leave me, all she would have had to do was utter "please" and he would have stayed - no matter how miserable it made him.

In those few agonizing seconds, Strauss was almost willing to tell him that she would sacrifice all that she believed in, break her vows and leave her husband as long as he didn't walk out of that door and her life forever. But deep in her heart, she knew that would ultimately destroy Rossi, as he was too honorable a man to be able to live with himself knowing he had made her go against her morals by disregarding the tenets of her faith, she held so dear. Even though she meant the words with every fiber of her being when she spoke her marriage vows, she knew that as much as she loved David Rossi, she would turn break those same vows in a heartbeat, God forgive her, if not for the fact that it would ultimately destroy him and she loved him too much for that. So even though she was dying inside, Erin kept silent. She shakily brought the same hand David had placed over his heart, to her mouth and bit down on her knuckle to keep from speaking the words her heart desperately wanted to cry out, as she watched the man she loved walk out of her life.

End of Part One

CMGUYSGIRL


	3. Chapter 3

**The Fathers of My Son **

Disclaimer**:** I don't own Criminal Minds. I barely own my mental sanity. Okay it is on lease and from the way it seems to be missing lately, I am thinking my lease is up.

A/N: I was intending to have this up on Thanksgiving night but was under the weather for the last few days, so apologies to those who would have liked more non-work days to be able to read and digest this. This is the last part that is written on this. I don't know if the voices are going to come back to it or not, so i try to make all the parts where they can be standalone. I do have one more story for this pair that I am still working on that was/is a Halloween themed/all Saint's day story (I know the holidays have passed but I started the story before then, so if the end ever comes to me).

A/N2: Visit You Give Me Fever, A Rossi/Strauss Forum  forum/You-Give-Me-Fever/120042/

Feel free to post your own story prompts/ideas at the forum. If you see an idea you want to adopt, go for it. The purpose of the forum is to get more fan fic stories featuring our pair, since the show is seriously depriving us of any scenes involving them. Now on with the story...

The Fathers of My Son

Erin Strauss kept her home life private from her work life. Due to her need to protect the secret of the paternity of her son Anthony, she rarely brought her children around her co-workers or the office. She had never brought any of the kids to work for take your child to work day. That wasn't to say that they had never been to Quantico. Out of necessity when she didn't have a babysitter, she had dragged them on a quick trip on a Saturday, well that was always her intention, but she usually stayed a lot longer than she originally intended, or after hours, and she needed some files from the office that she forgot or had to run in on her day off and finish one or two quick things when they were younger and she had no choice but to bring the kids at the time.

One day Anthony comes to the FBI building in Quantico. After Strauss gets a call from security, she goes down, gets him and takes him back to her office. Now this causes quite a bit of speculation around the Bureau, from those who sees her with the kid, wanting to know who he is and why he is there. Some may correctly surmise, as it makes the most common sense, that he is her son.

Rossi is out of the office at the time the child comes to the FBI building. Some people who have been around for a while, who have heard the old rumors, think the kid reminds them of someone. Others correctly guess that he belongs to Rossi as they have seen the pictures of her family in her office, or have met her ex-husband in the past at some function, and the child looks nothing like him, shares very few similarities with her, beyond her eyes and ears, instead inheriting his dark hair and most of his facial features from David Rossi.

Once they get back to Strauss' office, Anthony explains why he is there. He also tells his mother something she didn't know her ex had done to him in the past. She makes him promise not to tell his dad, which would be David, as she knows he would kill her ex-husband. Strauss doesn't want that as he is the father of her other children. Erin also doesn't want to see Rossi go to prison for murder.

Strauss takes Anthony home, and she proceeds to go over to her ex-husband's to confront him about his behavior, that caused their "son" (yeah it is a complicated, convoluted relationship but since she was married to him at the time, he was the child's stepfather and for appearances sake and to try to make things normal in their marriage for all their kids, the child always called her (ex)husband his father and David his dad, so that way it was no confusion on who was being talked about) to run away. While there she learns some other disturbing news about the way he and his new wife treat the her daughters. Erin threatens him and makes him agree to end his visitation time with the girls that second and allow her to take the kids home with her that night.

Meanwhile David has returned to the office and goes to see Erin. He finds out that she went home due to an emergency with her son, after he showed up at the office.

David is now worried about his son and his Girlfriend; He and Erin are dating again and are really close. He tries to call her and see what is going on while he is on the way to her home. Not receiving any answer on her cell, which she has left in the car in her purse in her haste to confront her ex-husband, he calls her home phone and his son, answers and tells his dad where his mom has gone. Even though Anthony doesn't tell what his mom made him promise not to tell, that his "father" hit him in the past, he does tell him what made him run away, basically how his "father had been mistreating him lately" and that his mom had gone to confront him about his behavior.

Rossi knows Strauss can more than handle herself, in a confrontation with her ex but he is Rossi and he just can't stop himself from going to make sure she is okay. As the man in her life, he wants her to know he supports her and has her back. The profiler also thinks to himself, God help the jerk if he looses his mind and lays a finger on Erin, because when Strauss gets through with him, he will make sure Richard Marksman never draws another breath and no one ever finds his body. Of course when Rossi arrives at the Marksman residence, Strauss has everything in hand. She is actually getting ready to leave, but is giving her ex one last warning.

Rossi walks into the house after he had checked on her girls that were in her car, when he drove up. They informed him of the little they knew, and told him the door was unlocked as they didn't lock it when their mom ordered them to "wait in the car, she would be right out" (as she didn't want them to hear what else she had to say to their father). Rossi walks in and hears Strauss informing her ex about the new custody arraignments she will be having her lawyer draw up, granting her full custody of the kids and giving up his visitation rights, until she deemed him fit to have unsupervised, and/or overnight visits. Strauss snarls at her ex, that he will sign if he knows what is good for him. David hears a little of what Richard has done to the kids and can't help but add his own promises of what will happen to her scumbag of an ex if he doesn't agree to Erin's terms.

Her ex-husband quickly agrees as he knows he has no choice. He might have been able to persuade the courts that he deserved visitation but he couldn't take a chance of Rossi ruining him and his business. Marksman knows the power Rossi has and that Rossi has a lot more "juice" than he could ever hope for even though he (Marksman) has more power than the avg guy.

Rossi and Strauss turn to leave but David can't resist getting in a dig and gloating a little. He tells the ex not to worry as He, Rossi, would make sure that Erin and her children were taken care of financially. The ex spits back that he pays child support, His Witch of an ex-wife makes sure of that, even though he might just take her up on her saying she doesn't want anything from him anymore, not even child support. Rossi laughs at this, and tells him the paltry amount of child support he gives Erin each month to take care of his children was an insult to his children. He informs him that as much money as he makes each year, and that he knows as it is a matter of public record since his company is a publicly traded entity on the stock market, that he should be ashamed on not providing better for his two kids, as Rossi even when she was married to the jerk of an ex husband, gave her more child support each one kid each month than he did for two.

The conversation mentioned that the ex made over five million a year and he gave her $1000 a month for his two children, while Rossi, who with his book deals, makes a ton more but he at least gave her $1500 a month for his one child plus, paid his tuition to that fancy school her ex insisted the children all attend, to the tune of $25,000 a year and paid his son's portion of the health care premiums, since Erin had him on her insurance at work, and reimbursed her for any deductibles his son incurred, not to mention, bumping up his child support in the two months before school started to $3000 a month so she could buy school clothes and uniforms for him. Rossi then informed him that he would be making sure that Erin and her other kids, the ex's children had everything they needed from now on, but he was going to do everything in his power to ensure that Erin changed her mind and continued to make Marksman pay child support to his kids as it would be good for his character and because he knew just how much it would piss him off each month when he had to write that check.

David then informed him that he, the ex husband would now be paying $2,500 a month for each of his two kids and that the money, that Erin didn't use on the two at the time, or didn't give them as their allowance, would be going into a fund for the girls to live on once they turned 18, until they turned 25 and gained full access to the trust funds Rossi had secretly set up for them years ago, when he set up the one the son he shared with her.

When the ex sneered and stated, why should I, David, took one menacing step towards the man and calmly stated, well calmly for David Rossi, because if you don't, I will call an emergency meeting of the board of the company you run and exercise my option to have you removed from said company.

Strauss' ex spat back with a laugh, you can't do that, while you may be able to do a lot of things, you can't control my company or my stock holders.

Rossi just snarls at him, think again Dipstick, see that is why you are as bad of a business man, as you were a husband. Since you obviously don't know, I suggest you check who your biggest stock holders are. Remember that huge economic setback you had 4 years ago due to those horrendous decisions you made while trying to expand and run a major competitor out of business at the same time? Well who do you think saved your company, and made your stock soar? I know Erin makes good money at the Bureau and that, I could have made sure that she and "her children" never wanted for anything, even if you company folded, but I also knew she would never let me do that, due to her pride and her wanting to preserve your pride and keep her marriage intact.

Heck I had to force her to allow me to provide the small amount of child support she lets me give her for my son each month. That is the same reason, he softened his tone as he turned slightly to look at Erin, as he had heard her audible gasp, when he made his statement, while keeping her ex and his new wife in his peripheral vision, that I kept all this about the trust fund and me buying the stock and forcing his competitor to sell out, from you. I know you wouldn't have accepted it and it would have upset you that I had done this for you. Erin, I just ... hope, one day, you will see your way to forgiving me, not only for doing it, but also for keeping it from you, as I promised I would not keep secrets from once you accepted me in your life again.

Erin refused to cry in front of her ex and his new wife but she was touched more than she could ever show - that this man, could love her so, when the man who had pledged his life to her, not once but twice, and to whom she had pledged her life to, could care less what happened to her or their kids. All she could manage to get out was, I love you, we will talk about it later. Anything more and the floodgates (she was sure she would have not been able to stop the tears from falling) would have opened and she would have told David Rossi how incredible a man he was and that she knew she was one of the luckiest women in the world to get a second chance to have him be a part of her life. And that was something she darn sure wasn't going to sully the memory of for David by doing it in front of the other two worthless occupants of the room. No that announcement could wait until they were alone together, where she could not only tell him but show him, letting her actions speak louder than her words ever could. With that thought, she realized that she had wasted enough of her and David's lives in this room, with her ex and his new wife and that one day, the scoundrel would realize all he had thrown away when he treated his children the way he did.

At first her heart had screamed that the best revenge on the butt-wipe would be for her and David and the children to show them just how happy they could be without him in their lives, but then her more logical mind took over and she realized that revenge was too much work and that when you sought it, you just gave that person a place in your life he or she doesn't deserve. Instead the best thing would be to not think about that person at all. She knew for her children, that would not be so easy as after all he was their father, but she was determined with all that she had in her to do her best, and in her heart, she knew without the shadow of a doubt, David would do all he could too, to make it as easy as possible for her kids to do. A stray though occurred in the back of her mind of how lucky she had been in the father dept and she made a mental note to call her daddy tonight and thank him for being such a great dad. With that though placed in the compartment where it belonged, she took a deep breath mentally and physically and when she spoke, she was in full Chief Strauss mode. She moved close enough to Rossi to gently squeeze his hand once as she looked him in the eye and asked him to go outside and check on the girls and wait with them until she came out. "I promise you, I'll only be a min. she assured him. I just need to say Goodbye to my ex husband in Private.

Something about the look in her eyes, silently communicated to Rossi that this was something she needed to do on her own, so for once in his life, he followed her directive without question (mentally she chuckled, that their was a first time for everything). As she watched David leave, she spoke to her ex and said snidely, you might want your little cheerleader to excuse herself also as I am sure you don't want her to hear what I have to say. Her ex retorted that their was nothing she had to say that his wonderful, sweet, caring, young, new wife, couldn't overhear but he none the less, told her to leave, having heard the tone of his ex wife's voice and knowing she knew about quite a few of the skeletons in his closet.

Once it was just her and him left in the room, Strauss turned and looked at her ex husband with an icy glare, and thundered, "The new custody agreement, with all the terms both David and I outlined today, will be messengered over to you as soon as my lawyer can draw them up and by all that is Holy you will sign and return them to my lawyer within 48 hours or I will make your life a living nightmare, before destroying you, publicly, financially and then I will continue to drag you through the court system, having your children testify to each and every horror I learned today that you put them through, until your reputation is so non existent that old scratch himself will be ashamed to have to come and collect you when it is your time to be carried off to hell".

Her ex had blanched at her statement but his color receded even more when she continued on without stopping and while I am at it, I could just anonymously tip off the SEC about the Alterman and Skylark deals as I am sure once they look into it, they would be quite interested in having a little chat with you. Don't worry I am sure it won't be too bad as they are showing such a "fondness" for insider trading these days.

Ooh and I am sure that your business partner, Kyle would love to sit down and have lunch or Dinner with me one night as it has been such a long time since we have done that. Now when was the last time, oh yes, right before our divorce. And if it should happen to 'slip' out that the reason I divorced you was that I discovered you were cheating on me with Kyle's 26 year old daughter... well I am sure he wouldn't be too upset. After all he is such a gentle man for someone 6'5 and weighing what, 290 pounds? I am sure he would be very understanding, since you are 'best friends' and business partners. What little color that was left in her ex's face deserted him completely and he slowly moved to the nearest chair and sunk into it, putting his head in his hand and telling Strauss "You win".

She heard him mutter something to the effect of marrying her was the worst mistake he ever made and that he should have known she was too much trouble when she refused to take his last name after they were married, but decided to be magnanimous and let it slide. Erin Strauss looked at the man she had married, twice and wondered what she could have been thinking when she fell in love with him all those years ago. She had always considered herself a great judge of character, so how could he have fooled her so completely, into thinking that he loved her back. Richard Marksman had proved to her the content of his character the night she discovered him in bed with his business partner's daughter.

FADE

TO

FLASHBACK

It was a good thing that she had left her gun locked in her purse in her trunk that night. She went to that hotel room straight from work after she received the flowers and card supposedly from her husband ,stating that he had been regretting them not spending anytime together lately as a couple. The card further explained that he had arranged for their housekeeper to spend the night with the kids, packed them both an overnight bag and had booked them a suite at the Fair Gardens Riviera Hotel (One of the best 5 star luxury hotels in DC). He wanted her to she come straight from work and informed her that he would be waiting for her at 7:15pm in Room 363.

He promised in the card that their would be no interruptions and that he had already made sure of that by turning off his cell phone and disconnecting the room phone. The letter had gone on to assure her she didn't have to worry about dinner for the kids as he had given the housekeeper money, and that she would be picking them up directly from school to take the kids out to their favorite pizza restaurant and the movies, that they wouldn't be home until bedtime and they would call them together after dinner - before they embarked on the rest of their night of reconnecting.

Erin had entered that hotel, expecting to enjoy dinner and a night of recapturing the passion that had been missing out of her marriage for the last year or so due to both her and her husband being workaholics. She had been telling him for the last few months that she was afraid that they were neglecting each other and that they needed to set aside sometime to just be husband and wife. She had even started leaving the office at 6 or 6:30 most nights as a way to show she was willing to do her part. Unfortunately most nights, her husband didn't make it home until after 11pm, closer to midnight and then it was budget review time again so the nights where she was able to leave on time with a clear conscious, became fewer and far between. Still even on those late nights, it was rare that she didn't beat her husband home, so when she received the flowers and card, "supposedly" from him, she mentally beat down the nagging voice of her conscious that tried to make her feel guilty about not staying until the budget issue was resolved as the final draft was due at the end of the week and it was already Tuesday. She rescheduled her meeting with the Unit chiefs until the next day, and left her office smiling in anticipation of the night to come. Little did she know what a nightmare she was about to blindly walk into.

She arrived at the hotel and made it to the room at exactly 7:15. She would have been a few minutes early, as she was so anxious to spend time with her beloved husband, but traffic was unusually heavy for a Tuesday night. When she knocked on the door, her then husband, who had been expecting room service to bring the food he had just ordered, answered the door in his bathrobe and was clearly surprised to see her. That was her first clue, that something was terribly wrong with this situation.

Her second was when his young "plaything" bounded up behind him and threw her robe clad arms around his waist before telling him to hurry up and let the person in with the food as she was starving after the workout he'd just put her through. It was only after the words had left the young tramp's mouth, that she must have felt her lover tense and looked around him and noticed it was not room service but his wife standing at the door.

To say that Erin was shocked, at what she was seeing would have been the understatement of the decade. She probably would have been standing there even longer if not for the oblivious room service waiter arriving behind her and announcing room service. That is probably the only thing that stopped her from ripping her husband and his tart apart limb from limb at that moment. Instead she turned without a word, skirted around the room service cart and walked away.

Insensitive prick that he was, her husband didn't even really try to stop her. Oh he called her name but he made no effort to go after her. If Erin Strauss was one thing, she was a woman with a formidable temper. And as the elevator slowly descended to the ground floor, that temper would have rivaled a category 5 hurricane.

She made it all the way to her car, visualizing what she was going to do to the two of them when she retrieved her purse out of the car trunk. She opened the trunk and grabbed her purse. She looked inside to grab her gun and that is when her eyes instead landed on the picture of her three children, lying open in her wallet where she had tossed it hurriedly into her purse after removing it from the pocket of the sweater she had been wearing in the office.

Lucky for her, seeing her children's bright and smiling faces was enough to break through the haze of her anger and cause her to stop and think about the consequences of her actions, namely loosing custody of her children, not to mention their love and respect, while she served time in prison for their father's murder. She couldn't do that to them. As much as she wanted to go back up to that room and make them pay for every little fragment they had just shattered her heart into, she wanted to be a part of her children's lives more. Strauss closed her trunk, and said a silent prayer, thanking God for not letting her do something stupid that would remove her out of her children's lives. She then walked to the driver's door of her car, unlocked it, got in and drove home. She was not in the best frame of mind to be driving and had to send up another prayer of thanks when she made it home safely.

Erin was surprised to see the lights on at the house and that is when she noticed her housekeeper's car in the driveway. It hadn't consciously dawned on her until then, that someone must have known her husband was having an affair and sent the card and flowers to show her what was going on. She had been expecting to come home to an empty house but now she had to put on her Strauss mask and go in and pretend in front of her children, that everything was fine, when inside she felt like she had just been sucked into an endless black-hole.

She knew her children were going to find out what was going on between her and their father, as their was no way she was staying with that creep after what she had discovered tonight, but she hoped to give them one more night of peaceful sleep before she had to give them the news that would shatter their young lives - that she was divorcing their father. Strauss just hoped Richard had the good sense not to come back to the house tonight. If he did, she knew that the kids would hear their argument, even if they had already gone to bed. She wasn't too worried about that as they had heard their parents argue before, although she usually tried, although very seldom successfully to keep the volume of her voice low so the kids wouldn't be aware, but they were human and after all, all couples have arguments some times. Erin just made sure she was still home the next morning when they got up to leave for school and that she spent a few minutes with them before they had to leave to reassure them that even though their parents had disagreed, extremely loud, the previous night, that they still loved each other and that they both loved their kids. She would then explain, that life is not always easy, some times couples will disagree, just like they sometimes disagreed as siblings, but love meant you found a way to work it out. Her children always seemed to buy into what she was telling them, but this time, she knew she couldn't give them that reassurance. As Erin unlocked the front door of her home, she wondered how much of a hypocrite her children would believe her to be after she told them, that she would be divorcing their father, that this time, love was simply not enough.

Later that night, Richard had indeed had the nerve to come home and act surprised when she told him, through the closed door, his packed suit cases were under the desk in his home office (He didn't allow the children in there, citing he kept important documents on his desk that he couldn't afford to have them disturb, so she knew they wouldn't see his suitcases in there). Erin refused to unlock the door to their bedroom to allow him admittance. That is when he fired his final volleys before he walked away telling her that he only married her for her family's money and connections and that he had been seeing several women (including the one he was now married to) since a year after they remarried.

Her soon to be ex, nastily informed her that the only reason he waited that long is that she had insisted on putting a clause in their prenuptial agreement that since they were giving the reconciliation a chance, the marital assets remain separated for the first year. He taunted her ever further by saying, when he found out she was going to have a baby by another man and he realized he couldn't force her to get rid of it, he had to make sure she wasn't going to decide that she needed to leave him to be with the baby's father as he still needed the benefits of the connections she brought to the marriage and that each day she was married to him, she paid a little more with a piece of her soul for bringing another man's child into the world and embarrassed him by letting that man be a part of her and the child's life.

He wasn't content to leave it at that, he had to add, that every time David Rossi's son called him father, it was just another turn of the knife in both of her and her former lover's hearts. It was perfect and fitting revenge for her forcing him to let Rossi be a part of his son's life, not to mention naming him after his biological father. He laughed demoniacally when he stated, "my son, loves me, and you and your lover, can't do anything about it. I hope you lie awake every night for the the rest of your life, thinking about that irony".

Her husband had the last laugh that night. Little did he know that the true irony would come all this time later, when his actions would push that same child to runaway from his house to his mother's office and reveal the mistreatment, he had suffered at the hands of a man, he thought had loved him. It was these same actions, that would lead her to go over to his house and make him a promise that she would make public the papers she found while packing up the rest of his belongings from the house they once shared together.

Some people would say that in the end, she had the last laugh, but she didn't feel like laughing. It was sad, that her whole marriage had been nothing but full of deception. It was even sadder that she had two kids, from this man who never loved her and that she had even given her other child, into his caring.

Flashing

even

further

back

When she had first discovered she was going to have David's baby, she had considered, never telling him. She knew she had to tell her husband as she had not slept with him again until after they married and she wasn't far enough along that she could even entertain that it was his baby, but for one brief time period, that she is certainly not proud of herself for, she seriously thought of never telling David or the child the truth. She knew it was wrong to not tell David. As much as she wanted to keep the secret, she knew in her heart of hearts that David and their child deserved to know each other.

Another thing she knew is that she would have to make sure that her children would always know that her son's conception wasn't something she was, or she should be ashamed of. She didn't cheat on her husband. They were divorced at the time. She would tell them when the time came, that she saw her son's birth as a gift she was given, one that she was able to share with her husband and one that he being the wonderful man and loving her as much as he did, accepted because he loved her and had come to love the child as his own. Erin knew that as much as it would make her have to work that much harder to reassure her husband that even though her son's biological father would be a part of his life, he as her husband would still be the child's father in the everyday when it counts.

Back

to

the

present

She had thought she knew a lot of things back then, and slowly but surely her ex had shown her how wrong she had been about all of it.

Somehow, while those painful memories had been running through her head, Erin had made it out of her ex-husband's house and over to her car where the man who loved her - without Reservations, had taken one look at her face and enfolded her in his warm embrace. He leaned his head back a little kissing her on the forehead and whispered, "it's alright, love of mine, no matter what he said or did in there, none of that will ever touch you or your children, I promise".

End of Part 2


End file.
